


Sleep Hath Its Own World

by coloredink



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Dreams, Lucid Dreaming, M/M, Sherlock is a jerk, The Adventure of the Three Garridebs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-11
Updated: 2012-07-11
Packaged: 2017-11-09 15:12:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/456904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coloredink/pseuds/coloredink
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Sherlock dreams were always an adventure, of sorts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sleep Hath Its Own World

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to HiddenLacuna, who noticed the things I was hoping nobody would notice.
> 
> Originally a kinkmeme fill for [this prompt](http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/13188.html?thread=73311108#t73311108), which requested John having lucid dreams about Sherlock, and then actually meeting the (much jerkier) Sherlock in real life. Has been edited quite a bit.

He was running. He could feel each foot strike the pavement below him, the shock travelling up through his soles and into his ankles and knees all the way up to his hips and back. His arms pumped in an alternating fashion, and his breath burned in his lungs. It was night, and he was in a city--in _the_ city--and he was running as if life and death hung in the balance. Maybe it did. Presently, gunfire sounded from behind him, and John ducked, though he couldn't tell if the bullet had come anywhere near him. He had a gun too, clutched in his left hand.

At some point, John became aware that this was a dream.

Only in dreams did he leap across rooftops ducking bullets; only in dreams did he run at all, when in the daytime he hobbled across the street with the aid of a cane and people gave up their seats for him on the bus. 

Ordinarily the dream ended when John realised that it was a dream, but this time it didn't, and he could cling a little longer to a world in which he could run. Someone ran beside and a little ahead of him, eating up the distance with his longer legs. John knew that he was following this man, that they were partners, in the way that one knows things in dreams without actually learning them. He also knew that that they needed to give their pursuers the slip very soon, before one or both of them keeled over; his legs became more and more loathe to obey him with every step.

Moments later, as if spurred by John's wishful thinking, his dream-partner dropped down into one of the alleys, so quickly at first that John's heart nearly stopped. But it turned out to be a fire escape, and Sherlock--the name came to John's mind without any conscious recall--beckoned John urgently from below. John eeled down the fire escape with unreal speed and landed on the ground with a hard thump, bending his knees to absorb the blow. They flattened themselves against the wall, in the shadow of a skip, and listened as the sounds of pursuit died away. 

Strangers rarely found their way into John's dreams. Why, when his subconscious had so many known people to choose from? Sherlock must have been someone that John had passed on the street or seen in a shop. He was certainly striking: tall and pale and thin, with miles of legs and cheekbones that frankly defied physics. He grinned at John now, and John grinned back.

 _Kiss him_ , John urged, giving the thought as much push as he could muster while still asleep, and Sherlock leaned in--or maybe John leaned in first--and their mouths met.

Then he woke up.

\-----

John admired the curve of his fingers around the head of the cane, the knobby bumps of his knuckles. He straightened his fingers, then wrapped them around the wood again and fiddled his cane back and forth. His hands were dry; he hated it when his palm got sweaty around the handle. He felt the way the tip dug into the rug and followed the weave with his eyes. He didn't look up when he heard Ella uncross her legs and recross them. He inspected the tasteful abstract art on the wall, noting how the carved geometric pattern of the frame complemented the artwork. He thought about what he was going to have for lunch after this was over. Realistically, he was going to stop by the Pret on the way home from the Tube and buy a sandwich. But perhaps he'd change it up today. Perhaps he'd stop by a Yo!Sushi, even though he couldn't really afford it on his pension. Why not? He deserved nice things. He was a fucking war veteran, after all.

Daylight stabbed through the blinds, shining a striped pattern on the rug. John thought about the dream he'd had last night. A lot of the time he woke up with his heart trying to hammer its way out of his chest, face wet, hands shaking and sheets soaked with sweat. The world seemed drab and dark after the vivid colours of dream-Afghanistan. This morning, however, he'd woken with his heart in his throat and a feeling of anticipation. Potential.

Eventually, Ella cleared her throat and nodded to the clock on the wall. "Time's up."

"Oh, already?" John gave her his mildest expression and used his cane to lever himself out of his chair.

"You have to talk about it eventually, John," she said.

"See you next week!" John called, and limped for the door.

\-----

It was the very early morning hours, fog lying thickly in the streets, and Sherlock and John were crouched behind a stone wall. Sherlock was just behind John, close enough that John could feel his heat. He was wearing that long coat of his, and a scarf. John was well-layered, but his jacket wasn't nearly as nice as Sherlock's coat and didn't have a substantial collar, and they'd been in this position for a long time. His knees and thighs ached, and his skin was cold underneath his jacket. He willed Sherlock to put his arm around him, as if he were eight years old again and wishing for a new bicycle for his birthday.

Sherlock put his hand on the back of John's neck. His leather gloves were warm from his skin and supple to the touch. "Soon," he murmured in John's ear. "It shouldn't be long now--ah, there he is!"

John leapt out from behind the wall, gun drawn. "Don't move!" he barked, but there wasn't any need. Lestrade--why was Lestrade here? Had he been here the whole time?--sprang out and cuffed their suspect, who snarled and struggled and finally went limp.

The front door of the house opened, shining out a long rectangle of golden light, and a tall, thin silhouette peered out at him. "Did you get him?"

"That we did," Sherlock said, with satisfaction. "And now, the bust, if you please."

The man disappeared back inside, reappearing a minute later with a white bust of Caesar. He passed it to Sherlock, who let it slip through his hands so that it shattered on the front doorstep.

"Oh," Sherlock said, calmly. "How clumsy of me." No one else seemed surprised or shocked, and so John wasn't, either. He knelt down next to Sherlock, who had squatted to sift through the white shards, poking the pieces this way and that with his gloved hand. Suddenly, a cry of delight, and Sherlock held up a fragment of pottery: embedded within it was a glittering green gem the size of a quail's egg. Behind them, their suspect gave a cry of anguish.

"That's it," Lestrade said. "That's it, all right." And John was dizzy with delight.

And after that, Sherlock kissed him. Were the police still there? Did it matter? Sherlock was kissing him, with all the joy and enthusiasm of a young boy, and John felt it flow down into him and bubble up through his fingertips.

Then he was awake. He could feel that his brain was awake. But he kept his eyes closed, despite the grey morning light that beat against his eyelids and the sounds of busses and cars and people walking, talking, shouting for cabs below his window. He tried to focus on Sherlock's mouth against his and the way Sherlock's fingers curled around his biceps. He clutched Sherlock's coat like it might keep him there, but already the background was disappearing, Sherlock himself turning transparent and then fading away into darkness, until John was simply lying in bed with his eyes closed. 

John opened his eyes. He blinked a few times, then closed them again, trying to bring back that mouth, that warmth. All he could summon was a picture of Sherlock, without any movement or life, so he gave up.

He didn't get out of bed right away, though. What was the point?

\-----

He went to physical therapy. He did his exercises. He bought a sandwich at Pret for lunch. He went to Sainsbury's and bought bread and beans and milk. He went home and stared at his blog for a bit, then logged out without writing anything. He flicked through all five channels on the telly twice, gave it up as a lost cause, and turned it off. He stared at the bed.

John wasn't certain that recurring dreams actually happened. Sure, people talked about them, wrote about them, but he was never quite sure that they weren't just making it up for a bit of attention. Certainly _he'd_ never had a recurring dream, unless you counted nightmares about being shot at, which he didn't.

But did twice count as a recurring dream? And they hadn't been the _same_ dream, even if they had featured the same person, and the same person kissing him. Probably John had subconsciously wanted to have the dream again--and who could blame him?--and so his brain had helpfully conjured it. Nice of it, really, to give him a break from all the guns and noise and blood.

It was dark out: perfectly acceptable time for a man to be in bed. John hadn't been sleeping well recently, anyhow.

\-----

Sherlock naked was exactly as John had expected: long and lean and miles of skin that just begged to be kissed. But he couldn't, because Sherlock was sprawled all over him and seemingly determined to let no inch of John's skin go untouched. _Move_ , John told himself, but his limbs were too heavy to lift. He had to lie there while Sherlock ran his lips over John's collarbone and up one arm, until he could press a kiss into the centre of John's palm. It was hardly unpleasant, but John wanted to reciprocate.

Sherlock turned his attention to John's shoulder, where the skin was all cracked and scarred, and for a minute his touch turned clinical. He ran first his fingers over the scar tissue, and then his lips, so light that John could barely feel it. Then he pressed his fingertips into John's skin at various places, perhaps testing for elasticity or responsiveness. It made John feel as if he were back in physical therapy.

He must have tensed up or otherwise shown his discomfort, because Sherlock stopped almost immediately and brushed another kiss against John's shoulder. "Does it hurt?"

"No, it doesn't hurt."

"Do you have full range of motion?"

"Mostly. I can't raise it as high as the other, but almost."

Sherlock spoke his next words against John's jaw. "I'll move the cups from the top shelf." His voice buzzed against John's mandible.

John sucked in a breath. "That's very kind of you."

"Can't have there be any difficulty in you making tea for me."

 _Move_ , John urged, and after what felt like forever pushing at his dream-self, he rolled them over so that he was half-pinning Sherlock, his hands on Sherlock's shoulders and his legs splayed out over the bed. Sherlock's gaze turned wary and speculative, and John let go of one of Sherlock's shoulders to brace himself on the bed with his elbow. The other hand he used to cradle the side of Sherlock's face as he kissed him. Sherlock's lips were warm and dry and clumsy.

When they broke apart, Sherlock said, "I haven't done this much."

 _I can tell_ , John didn't say. "We'll take it slow."

Sherlock narrowed his eyes. "You don't have to coddle me."

"It's called being _considerate_. Something you don't know much about, but us ordinary people appreciate it." John bent his head to place open-mouthed kisses along Sherlock's jaw, trailing down to his chest.

"I'm saying it's not necessary. I've done extensive reading on the subject."

John looked up. He brought his body up next to Sherlock's. "This isn't really your area, is it?"

Sherlock's eyes slid away from John's. "No, but it's yours. It seemed...relevant."

"Sherlock Holmes." John grinned into Sherlock's chest. "Are you saying that you read up on sex for me?"

"I didn't want to disappoint."

John laughed. Oh, Sherlock, you could never disappoint me, he wanted to say, but at that moment a car alarm went off and the dream vanished like smoke.

John squeezed his eyes shut, as if making the darkness more complete could bring back Sherlock, the sheets mussed beneath them, that dark bedroom. But there was no blocking out that ceaseless blaring. John could feel how alone he was in his narrow bed, the coarse sheets rubbing against his skin. He'd kicked the duvet halfway down.

The beeping stopped. John opened his eyes. It was still dark, the streetlights outside his window glowing dim orange. The clock read 2:14. John rolled over and closed his eyes again. He counted sheep 'til he fell into an intermittent doze, but Sherlock did not make a reappearance.

\-----

"How've you been sleeping?"

John shrugged. "All right."

"Have there been any more nightmares?"

"No, actually," John said, without thinking. Ella raised her eyebrows. He could have bashed himself about the legs with his own cane.

Ella angled her notebook higher, so that John couldn't see it. "Really."

"I mean, I don't really remember," John said, quickly.

"Interesting." She didn't write anything down. "I'd say that's progress, wouldn't you?"

"I don't know." John shifted in his seat. "I mean, I don't remember the new dreams. If there are any."

"We all dream," said Ella. "In fact, we have 20 to 30 dreams a night. It's just that we don't remember most of them. But in fact, dreams are necessary to our functioning."

"I know that," John said. "I _am_ a doctor, you know."

Ella smiled. "Of course."

\-----

The sun was so, so bright, washing the sand into a glaring white, oversaturating the greens and browns of their uniforms into fluorescent colours. John squinted off the back of the truck. "Hey," he called, "d'you think we should've turned ri--"

Noise. Smoke. Fire. Pain. Screaming.

John jerked awake, his heart lurching to beat its tiny fists against his sternum, his t-shirt stuck to him with sweat. His throat clicked as he swallowed. He closed his eyes and breathed through his nose.

Beside him, Sherlock stirred. "Nightmare." It was a statement, not a question. Sherlock didn't ask questions he already had the answer to.

John nodded, eyes still shut. He felt Sherlock's warm hand on his shoulder.

"I'm here," said Sherlock.

Somehow, absurdly, that helped. John took another deep breath, held it, and let it out. His heartbeat slowed. Eventually, Sherlock's hand slid away, and John opened his eyes. Sherlock beside him was a pale sliver in the dark, his hair a black tangle spilling across the pillow, and John was seized with the urge to kiss him. So he did, over and over again, until he woke up.

\-----

The Sherlock dreams were always an adventure, of sorts. Sometimes there was running and shooting, but it was always John doing the shooting, and it was always someone who deserved to be shot. Someone who was trying to hurt someone else, or who had already hurt someone else.

But sometimes they were sitting-around-indoors dreams, too. Sherlock drew and pasted things all over the walls, conducted smelly experiments in the kitchen, and made the most alarming screeching sounds on the violin. He also played the violin well, at times, usually songs that John recognised from television adverts and movie trailers. Well, of course; these were dreams, and so they had to be songs that John knew. His brain wouldn't spontaneously compose classical music for him, would it?

He almost missed the nightmares. It's a relief, see, waking from nightmares. Whatever it is you're waking up into, it's got to be better than the nightmare.

But there was nothing better than Sherlock. Sherlock, with his dazzling intellect and his striking good looks. Sherlock, with his heart-stopping smile and his elegant shirts. Sherlock, with his careful worship of John's body and his adoration for the inside of John's elbow, his knees, and the soles of his feet. Sherlock, who led John down dark alleyways and across rooftops in pursuit of justice. (Really? Was that so? It was so in the dreams, because things are always just so in dreams.)

\-----

"You missed our appointment. I was concerned."

"Sorry." John rubbed his eyes. "I was napping and lost track of time."

Brief silence from the other end of the line. "Have you been sleeping a great deal?"

"No," John lied. "Not any more than usual, I mean. But I didn't sleep well last night, so I had a bit of a nap today."

More silence. "All right. Do you want me to schedule you in for later this week? I can fit you in on Friday."

"No, I think I'll just skip this week," John answered. "It's fine. I'll see you at the usual time next week."

\-----

"I prefer to text."

It was _him_. It was all John could do not to just stand there and gape, because that was _surely_ Sherlock Holmes, from the top of his arrogant head to the bottoms of his Italian shoes. "Here, use mine," he blurted out, and tried not to drop his phone as he dug it out of his pocket.

Sherlock's glance slid across John's face, and then he turned his attention to texting. John fidgeted beside him.

"Afghanistan or Iraq?" Sherlock queried, as if he were asking whether John preferred jam or butter on his toast.

John blinked. "Sorry?"

"Which was it, Afghanistan or Iraq?"

In his dreams, of course, Sherlock was unsurprised by John's nightmares, his illegal gun, his accuracy, his medical know-how. John had never questioned it; it was part of the dream-logic. But here, in the real world, Sherlock shouldn't have known. Couldn't have known. Right? Except that he _did_ know, clearly, and--John couldn't think about this anymore, because his head was going to explode. He felt as if he hadn't gotten enough sleep even though for the past week he'd been sleeping what must have been 12 hours out of every 24.

"Afghanistan," he said. "Sorry, how did you--?"

Then came the string of rapid-fire observations. Sherlock--if this was Sherlock, but he looked so much like Sherlock, stood and walked and talked like Sherlock--seemed to somehow know that John was here in search of a potential flatmate, and also that John would come with him to look at the flat, no questions asked. His smile rucked up his cheeks but didn't touch his eyes.

"The name's Sherlock Holmes, and the address is 221B Baker Street," he said, on his way out, and he _winked_.

John wasn't sure what he'd been hoping for, but it probably wasn't this.

\-----

He didn't know why he'd never tried Googling it before. Sherlock Holmes wasn't exactly the most common of names, after all. He would have found out immediately that the man existed, although there were no photographs of him on his website.

He met Sherlock outside the flat the next day, and his heart began to pound as soon as he saw the door. He _knew_ that door, just as he knew the little sandwich shop on the ground floor. He'd climbed those stairs many times in his dreams. He recognised the wallpaper, that couch, that rug--even the glassware and scientific paraphernalia all over the kitchen table, the animal skull on the wall (although he'd never noticed before that it appeared to be wearing headphones). Not all the boxes, though. Those were probably left over from the previous tenant.

"This is nice." He tried to keep his tone casual as he stumped around the already familiar flat. "This is very nice."

"Yes, I thought so myself," Sherlock said in the background.

"Soon as we get this rubbish cleared out--" He stopped. Sherlock looked faintly abashed and immediately began moving things around.

"There's another bedroom upstairs if you'll be needing two bedrooms," said Mrs Hudson.

John blinked. Oh. Right. Yes. "Of course we'll be needing two."

"Oh, don't worry, we've all sorts around here," Mrs Hudson burbled. "Mrs. Turner next door's got married ones."

This was going to drive him mad. What were those dreams, then, if not purely figments of his imagination? Maybe he'd passed Sherlock on the street once, maybe that was how his brain had known what image to summon up, but what about this flat? He remembered shagging on that couch.

He needed to sit down.

Then: "Want to see some more?"

God, yes. Yes, of course, a thousand times yes. He wanted to see if this was the part he'd always dreamed of.

\-----

"You don't have a girlfriend, then," John said, a little desperately.

"Not really my area," Sherlock replied.

"Do you have a boyfriend? Which is fine, by the way," John added.

Sherlock slanted him a frowning look. "I know it's fine."

"Right. Okay. You're unattached, just like me." John pushed his pasta around on his plate--did he even order this?--and tried not to smile. "Fine. Good."

Sherlock's frown cleared into something approaching discomfort. "John." He cleared his throat. "I think you should know that I consider myself married to my work, and while I'm flattered by your interest, I'm really not looking--"

"No," John interjected before this already awkward conversation could get any worse. He shouldn't have gotten his hopes up; what made him think that he could just step into something ready-made? "I'm just saying. It's all fine."

"Good. Thank you." Sherlock went back to watching the street.

Why on Earth would anyone say thank you at the end of a conversation like that? Even someone like Sherlock, who obviously didn't have a very good grasp of the emotional level of things. John didn't really have any time to dwell on it, however, because the next thing he knew, they were chasing after a cab. On foot. Over the rooftops.

And then it was _just_ like one of his dreams. His feet pounding against the brick, sailing him over gaps between the buildings, down fire escapes and over chain link fences, careening 'round corners. It was brilliant. His lungs burned fit to burst, but he'd never been happier, joy and adrenaline singing through his blood, his heartbeat thudding _remember this, remember this, remember this_. He could have laughed. He _did_ laugh, later, when they were back at Baker Street, and there, that was the Sherlock that he knew, the Sherlock with the crooked smile that twisted his face into something weird and adorable. And when he answered the door and Angelo handed him his cane and John looked back at Sherlock with such amazement--

So, just to seal the deal, he shot a man, and he let Sherlock know it.

\-----

The sun was so, so bright, washing the sand into a glaring white, oversaturating the greens and browns of their uniforms into fluorescent colours. John squinted off the back of the truck. "Hey," he called, "d'you think we should've turned ri--"

Noise. Smoke. Fire. Pain. Screaming.

John jerked awake, his heart lurching to beat its tiny fists against his sternum, his t-shirt stuck to him with sweat. His throat clicked as he swallowed. He closed his eyes and breathed through his nose. When he no longer seemed in imminent danger of vomiting all over his sheets, he heaved himself, trembling, out of bed. He stripped off his sweaty shirt and pulled on a clean one before padding downstairs.

Sherlock was in the sitting room, hunched over John's laptop, his face illuminated by the blue glow of the screen; the rest of the room was dark. His hair was a nest of wild curls, his toes curled slightly under his bare feet, his brows drawn together in the centre of his forehead. His t-shirt under his dressing gown was inside-out, the tag sticking out. John paused in the entrance to the sitting room for a moment, wondering if Sherlock would acknowledge him, but Sherlock didn't even look up from his screen. He hadn't the last three times, either. Finally, John switched on the light--Sherlock still did not look up--and made his way to the kitchen, where he banged the kettle against the counter as he started boiling water for tea. Sherlock made an irritated sound.

John leaned against the counter. He scrubbed his still-sweaty palm through his hair and glared at Sherlock, who was still hunched over John's laptop as if he hadn't a computer of his own. What was he doing, anyway? Probably yelling at idiots on his website or hacking into some national security database or even just reading personals on Gumtree. John gave him a little push with his mind: _Say something. Notice me._ Sherlock would never say something like _Are you all right?_ (he would consider that a frivolous question when John was clearly not all right) or _Want to talk about it?_ (Sherlock had little to no interest in the mundane details of other people's lives, and certainly not their feelings or the contents of their dreams), but John could imagine him making an observation: _Nightmare, I see_ or even gesturing John over, _Look at what I found!_ Something, anything, to indicate that Sherlock noticed him at all.

But Sherlock just double clicked on something and frowned at the screen. His fingers flew over the keyboard. John felt stupid. He turned his back to Sherlock and stared at the cupboards. As soon as the kettle clicked over, he poured the water over his tea and took it upstairs. Sherlock didn't even watch him go.

\-----

Long, screeching notes pulled John from his slumber. At first he just lay there, blinking, not certain what was going on. Then that awful wail came again, and he _knew_ that sound; he'd heard it in his dreams. He sat up and rubbed one hand over his face as the cacophony floated up the stairs, then heaved himself out of bed. The air was cold against his skin, so he shrugged on his dressing gown and belted it around his waist before tottering down the stairs.

"Sherlock, what on _earth_ ," he hissed.

Sherlock spun round on his heel and raised his eyebrows at John. He was immaculately dressed tonight, as if he was going to be attending dinner at a fine restaurant. He brought the bow down against the strings and ground out another note. 

John winced. "You'll wake Mrs Hudson," he pointed out.

"She knew what she was getting into. As did you." Sherlock turned his back on John and continued playing for an imaginary audience outside the window, even though the blinds were drawn. John rubbed his forehead with the heel of his hand and, finding that there was nothing to do, went back upstairs and burrowed into the covers. The neighbours started rapping on the walls before long, but the playing went on and on. John pulled one of his pillows over his head and shut his eyes. He wanted Sherlock to play something nice; something from a movie soundtrack or an advert. Some _music_ , at least. But he didn't. The violin just shrieked and wailed on and on.

The next day, when Sherlock introduced him as a friend, John corrected that to colleague. You couldn't blame him for being a little bit bitter.

\-----

John opened the door to 221, blanched, and walked straight out again, making sure to shut the door. He deposited the shopping bags on the fron step, took several deep breaths, and held the last one. Then he opened the door and launched himself up the stairs and into the flat. His eyes watered when he got to 221B, and he had to squint through the tears as he flung open every window he could find, even the one in the bathroom. His own bedroom wasn't quite so bad, and he stuck his head out of the window there and took several deep, cleansing breaths.

Sherlock wasn't even home. John went back downstairs, collected the shopping, brought them upstairs, and put them away. Milk and bread and beans, and for some reason Sherlock had wanted some corned beef.

The man himself was home not ten minutes later. He gave a short, sharp cry as soon as he opened the door, then stormed up the stairs with a scowl on his face. "You opened the windows. Why?"

John stared. "Because it was _foul_ in here."

Sherlock sighed and flung his arms skyward as if beseeching the heavens to tell him why he'd been burdened with such an imbecile. "It was part of an experiment; I needed to know the thickness of the atmosphere at the time of death! Now I'll have to text Lestrade and let him know I need an extra day. I hope you're happy at having obstructed justice." He gave John a haughty look, whipped off his scarf, and flounced into his room, leaving John gaping behind him.

"No supper for you, then?" he called.

Sherlock didn't reply.

\-----

"I'm afraid I'm working on a very important blackmail case at the moment and can't afford to leave London."

John stifled a yawn behind his fist and added a petal to the flower in the margin of his notebook. Trust Sherlock to be such a berk that he'd let the young woman in, listen to her story with every evidence of attention, and then tell her that he couldn't help her after all.

Miss Smith deflated. "Oh. But I came all this way, and I told you--"

"But I'll send my partner, John Watson." Sherlock nodded to John.

John all but fell out of his chair. "I say--what?"

Miss Smith looked equally dubious. Sherlock said, "I rely on his senses as much as my own, and his judgment is second only to mine." His smile was thin and impersonal, but John felt his heart warmed anyway. "With John's eyes and my mind, I'm confident that we'll be able to solve your case."

"Thank you." Miss Smith beamed. She sat up straighter and smiled, and it seemed to brighten the whole room. "Thank you, Mr Holmes. I feel ever so much better."

Sherlock waved his hand. John rose to his feet and saw her out. He came back upstairs to find Sherlock already up, studying his web of blackmail pinned up above the mantelpiece.

"What's this about my senses? And my judgment?" John crossed his arms. "Just yesterday you said I was an imbecile who couldn't be trusted with sorting the mail."

"Your senses and judgment are fine, even if you haven't my specialised knowledge." Sherlock moved one of the pins, with its attached thread, to a different location on his "map." "I suspect her case is not very difficult."

"So simple that even I can handle it, then?"

Sherlock gave John an exasperated look over his shoulder. "I wouldn't send _Anderson_ on this case alone. I wouldn't send anyone I didn't trust to act sensibly and uphold my reputation. Now go and buy a train ticket. Use my card."

John stood and gaped for a good fifteen seconds, but it didn't do any good, as Sherlock had disappeared into the world on the wall. So he shrugged and sat down at the table to boot up his laptop. He had new mail: photos of a flat in Surrey that he'd found on Gumtree. He glanced over his shoulder at Sherlock, then pecked out a quick reply: _Sorry, I've decided not to move after all. Best of luck to you._

Sherlock loomed over John's shoulder. John closed the window hurriedly, but he needn't have worried: Sherlock, eyes narrowed, said only, "Your laptop has a webcam."

 

\-----

"Are you going to pick the lock?" John looked over first his left shoulder, then his right, but it was dark and late and no one was on the street. "Nobody's coming."

"No need." Sherlock drew a set of keys from his pocket.

The room was dark and quite warm, with the red glow of many heat lamps. It was much less macabre by night, actually, despite the snakes that coiled and slithered in their tanks and terrariums; in the dark, it was harder to see the stuffed mice on the bookshelf, dressed in tiny Victorian outfits and posed as if taking high tea, or the crocodile skull on the coffee table, or the mounted "unicorn's head" on the wall (really a white horse's head, with a fibreglass horn protruding from its forehead). Sherlock shut the door behind him and locked it again, and the two men made their way through the dark sitting room to crouch behind the sofa. John took out his gun.

Somewhere past midnight, and probably closer to two in the morning, they heard the scrape of a key in the door. John held his breath as the door swung open and made sure to let it out slowly as John Garrideb, aka James Winter--John recognised that hawkish profile against the streetlamps outside--stepped inside, shutting the door quietly behind him. He flicked on the light before crossing the cramped sitting room, his footsteps loud and careless. John blinked in the sudden light. For a moment he was afraid that Winter was going to come round the sofa, but he stopped at the coffee table. He shoved it aside, took out a knife, and began to cut up a section of the rug.

Sherlock's fingers brushed against John's hand. They nodded at each other, once, before bolting from behind the couch, John's knees cracking at the sudden movement. Sherlock called out, "Stop right there, Mr Winter."

Winter froze, shoulders hunched, knife still buried in the rug. He looked up, slowly, to find John's gun pointed at his face. He grinned. "And this is why I didn't want to get a detective involved. I guess that means you've got it all figured out?"

"Indeed we do," Sherlock drawled. He finished thumbing his phone and tucked it back into his pocket. "The police are on their way now."

Winter shifted his weight back onto his feet, like he was about to get up. "Don't move," John snapped.

"Wouldn't dream of it."

It was that smooth delivery that should have warned John. Winter moved like he was raising his hands, but there was something in one of those hands, something that wasn't the knife that was still stuck in the floor. He didn't even know where Winter got it from. But there was a _bang_ , and then John felt a sickening white-hot pain in his arm. He squeezed off a shot of his own and heard Winter curse, but he didn't know if it'd hit or not. God, it hurt just as much the second time. He heard Sherlock yell, and then a crash and a thud.

John gathered his wits to find that he'd fallen down a little bit behind the sofa, clutching its back with both hands. He was still clutching his gun. He could hear Sherlock, on the other side of the sofa, and what sounded like someone smacking a side of meat over and over again with a piece of lumber. Then he realised that that was Sherlock, punching Winter, and he heaved himself up to find that, yes, Sherlock was straddling Winter on the floor. He drew his fist back for another punch, then paused, seemed to rethink this, and pulled the knife out of the floorboards.

"Sherlock!" John barked.

Sherlock stopped. He looked over his shoulder at John. His expression was perfectly blank and unreadable.

"Don't," said John. "Don't you _dare_. I'm fine. It's just a scratch." He looked down at his arm. Both his jacket and the shirt beneath were torn, and he could feel that his sleeve was soaked all the way down to his cuff. "I'll just need a few stitches."

He came out from behind the sofa. Sherlock got up off of Winter, who was sprawled unconscious on the floor. Jesus. His nose was smashed and pulsing blood; one of his teeth lay on the floor next to his head; blood welled from his open mouth; he'd be fortunate if both his eyes weren't swollen shut tomorrow. John took the knife from Sherlock's hand, wiped the handle on his shirt, and knelt to wrap Winter' fingers around it. Then he stuck it back in its original hole in the floor.

"You're very good at this," Sherlock said, admiringly.

"Shut up," said John, as the blessed sound of sirens filled the air.

\-----

"And...why, exactly, does his face look like that?" Lestrade queried.

"He shot John," Sherlock said, stiffly. "It was self-defence."

"Self-defence if _John_ had beat him to a pulp, maybe," Lestrade said, like he was speaking to a small child. When Sherlock replied with stony silence, he sighed and said, "Statements tomorrow morning, you know the drill. Don't leave town."

Sherlock nodded and went to join John, who'd overheard the whole thing from the back of the ambulance, where a very nice technician was putting a pressure bandage on his arm and trying once again to get him to go to A&E. "No need," John said for the third time. "I'm a doctor, I know. It just needs stitches. Sherlock will put them in for me."

Sherlock brightened. "I will?"

"Yes," said John. "Much easier than putting them in myself." He hopped down from his perch and shrugged his jacket back on, sighing over the hole in the sleeve. Working with Sherlock was hard on the wardrobe. "What did Lestrade have to say?"

"Oh, you know, the usual." Sherlock waved a careless hand. "Let's go home."

Sherlock was quiet in the cab, and not in his usual thoughtful way; he kept looking at John, and each time he did the line between his eyebrows deepened. John just closed his eyes and wished the throbbing pain in his arm would go away.

The first thing he did when they got home was go straight to the bathroom, open the first aid kit, and take two pills. Then he took off his jacket and shirt, heaved himself up on the counter, and said, "You'll need to disinfect it first."

Sherlock hovered in the doorway. "Should I fetch the whisky?"

"No." John rubbed his eyes. "I took something already."

Sherlock took off his coat and scarf--it did not escape John's notice that the scarf was spattered with flecks of rust--and pulled on a pair of gloves. (So the man _did_ understand proper sanitation!) The wound had stopped bleeding, but it began to ooze again, sluggishly, as Sherlock cleaned it with an antiseptic. John winced.

The sutures in the first aid kit were the disposable, pre-threaded kind, so all Sherlock had to do was press the needle through the skin, thread it through to the other side, and then tie it off. He was actually quite adept at this--John was not about to ask why--but he was quiet, his dark head bowed over John's arm. John stared at the wall opposite and tried to keep his arm from twitching.

"Tell me about the case," John said. "You never explained it all."

"Hmmm." Sherlock finished tying off the suture and snipped the ends. "John Garrideb, as you know, is actually James Winter, a notorious American thief and bank robber. He spent thirty years in prison and due to overcrowding was released for having been on good behaviour." He paused in his story to push another needle into John's skin and tug the thread through. "He came to London looking for his old partner, Bill Evans, who escaped with the goods and was never captured. Nathan Garrideb turned out to be occupying Evans' old flat, but as you observed, he was a man who had no reason to ever leave his home, conducting all of his business online."

John nodded.

"And so he devised this ruse, taking advantage of our client's unusual surname, to send him to Birmingham on a wild goose chase, while he entered Garrideb's flat with a copy of the key, in hopes of finding where Evans stashed the loot. And we were there to catch him in the act," Sherlock tied off the last suture, "although you sustained a bit of collateral damage." Snip. Snip. "There."

John looked down to find a row of five perfect sutures, spaced evenly apart. They looked like something out of a textbook. He didn't think he could have done better himself. "Thanks." He slid onto the floor, holding onto the edge of the counter until he was sure his knees would support him. "For taking care of that."

Sherlock was stripping off his gloves and putting away the first aid supplies, and did not reply.

\-----

The needle hooked through the skin. Sherlock pulled it through to the other side and up, until the thread was roughly the same length on both ends, and tied the two ends together in a deft surgeon's knot. He worked in quiet, dark head bowed over John's arm, his brows furrowed together in concentration. The bathoom was full of nothing but the sounds of their breathing, and the occasional slosh of the whisky bottle as John took another slug. John stared at the wall opposite and let himself go warm and numb.

"Tell me about the case," John said, when it no longer seemed like a good idea to take another drink. "You never explained it all."

"Hmmm." Sherlock finished tying off the suture and snipped the ends. "John Garrideb, as you know, is actually James Winter, a notorious American thief and bank robber. He spent thirty years in prison and due to overcrowding was released for having been on good behaviour." He paused in his story to push another needle into John's skin and tug the thread through. "He came to London looking for his old partner, Bill Evans, who escaped with the goods and was never captured. Nathan Garrideb turned out to be occupying Evans' old flat, but as you observed, he was a man who had no reason to ever leave his home, conducting all of his business online."

John nodded. "Mmm."

"And so he devised this ruse, taking advantage of our client's unusual surname, to send him to Birmingham on a wild goose chase, while he entered Garrideb's flat with a copy of the key, in hopes of finding where Evans stashed the loot. And we were there to catch him in the act," Sherlock tied off the last suture, "although you sustained a bit of collateral damage." Snip. Snip. "There."

John looked down to find a row of five perfect sutures, spaced evenly apart. They looked like something out of a textbook. He didn't think he could have done better himself. "Thanks." He slid onto the floor, holding onto the edge of the counter until he was sure his knees would support him. "For taking care of that."

Sherlock was stripping off his gloves and putting away the first aid supplies. "Thank you," he said, gravely, without looking at John, "for allowing me to."

John woke up. He rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. His arm throbbed a dull reminder of the day's events.

He hadn't had one of those dreams since he'd moved into 221B Baker Street. What the fuck did it mean now?

\-----

Sherlock was silent for the next several days, which was in itself not unusual: Sherlock after a case ate a great deal, slept even more, and generally exuded an air of satiation, that is, until he descended into boredom and outrage. This time, however, Sherlock's silence was pensive and intense. John felt Sherlock's eyes follow him from room to room, and occasionally he'd turn around from making a cup of tea in the kitchen or get up from his seat in the sitting room to find Sherlock hovering over him like an uneasy guardian.

"It's healing fine, you know," he said. He was in his chair in the sitting room, reading _The Lancet_ ; Sherlock was sitting--sitting! not sprawled over!--on the sofa, fingers tented over his lips, staring at John's arm, as if he could see through the layers of fabric to the skin below. "If you were worried about that," John added. 

Sherlock only snorted and looked away. John rolled his eyes. Of course; Sherlock didn't do anything as pedestrian as _worry_ , and certainly not about his _friends_. Well. Friend, at least. John went back to his magazine.

A few minutes later, Sherlock said, "I would have killed him."

"I know," John said, without looking up from his magazine. "You were a fair bit of the way there. Good thing I stopped you."

"You killed a man for me, a day after meeting me," Sherlock pointed out.

"That I did."

"And it didn't bother you."

"Not even a little." John turned a page, although he hadn't absorbed anything on the previous one. "But I'd done it before. And he wasn't a very nice man."

"Neither was Winter." Sherlock plucked at a stray thread on a cushion John hadn't noticed in the flat before. It looked more like something that would belong to Mrs. Hudson: pink and gold, with embroidered vines and birds on it. "He hurt you."

"Yes. But it's healing fine. Like I said. Your stitches were very good." John put down his magazine. This kind of diffidence from Sherlock was unusual, and the fidgeting. "What's this about?"

Sherlock frowned but didn't look up from his picking. "I put you in danger."

"Yes. I like it, generally," John pointed out, gently. "But it's all right. It was just a scratch."

Sherlock let out his breath through his teeth. "I wanted to kill him."

John didn't know how to respond to that.

"I thought he'd killed you," Sherlock went on.

"If you'd bothered to turn around, you would have noticed I wasn't."

Sherlock shook his head. "I couldn't--I was irrational. _Irrational_." He scowled. "All I could think about was, was making him pay. For what he'd done." He looked up at the ceiling and sighed his next breath out through his nose. "If he'd actually killed you, I doubt he would have left that room alive."

John chewed on the inside of his cheek a few times before replying, "Well, that's...very nice to know, I suppose. That you. Care. And a little terrifying."

"Yes." Now Sherlock sounded wondering. "I suppose I do. Care. I've never...cared, before."

"Now I'm flattered." And John picked back up his magazine.

\-----

Several days later, John opened his eyes in the middle of the night for he wasn't sure what reason, only to discover that that reason was Sherlock, looming at the foot of his bed. John gasped and snatched at the gun that wasn't under his pillow, ran himself up against the headboard, and finally rubbed both trembling hands over his face and said, "Jesus Christ, Sherlock, I told you not to _do_ that." 

Sherlock tossed his head and perched himself at the edge of John's mattress. "You have more experience. With...caring."

John took in a deep breath and expelled it in a sigh. "Yes, I suppose I do. Maybe."

Sherlock looked down at his hands, which were gathered quietly in his lap. "I've never wanted to kill anyone before. Not like that. In fits of extreme anger, perhaps. Or for the pursuit of scientific knowledge. The occasional fantasy. But never so--irrationally. I've never wanted to kill _for_ someone before." He looked up at John. It was too dark to see his expression properly; John could only just make out the shape of his face from the streetlamps through the window. "What do you think it means?"

John thought very carefully about what it meant to have Sherlock Holmes willing to kill for him, swallowed down against the pressure of his rising heartrate, and said, "I think it means you care about me very much."

"I suppose it does." Sherlock tilted his head, his hair falling across his face, and said, "Love is a motivating factor in a significant number of crimes that I've solved."

John wasn't sure he'd call those crimes motivated by _love_ : jealousy, perhaps, or lust, but not love. But it was difficult to think about that now, when his heart hammered against his chest and Sherlock was _in his bed_ (all right, not quite, but very close to it) and John could remember with mouth-drying clarity the feel of Sherlock's skin against his--in his dreams.

Sherlock looked up at John, and even though John couldn't see his face he felt pinned. "I've given this a great deal of thought, and I've come to the conclusion that I may love you."

"Ah," said John. His head felt very light.

"I've little experience." The admission seemed to pain Sherlock. John couldn't blame him; Sherlock so hated to admit not knowing anything, and this was something that would pain anyone.

"That's all right," said John. "It's all fine, as I said before." And before his nerves could fail him, he crawled out of the sheets and over the duvet until he was next to Sherlock, dressed in nothing but a t-shirt and boxers. Sherlock was in his dressy gown and pyjama trousers and that ratty t-shirt. He turned Sherlock's face towards his and kissed him. Sherlock's lips were warm. They were still at first, until John probed them with his tongue, and then they parted in something like amazement. John thought his heart might stop.

"Oh," said Sherlock, when John pulled away to see if his surmise had been correct. He brought his hands up to curl around John's biceps, fingers moving over the recently healed gash on his arm. The sutures had just come out yesterday. "Oh. I see."

"Yes?" John thought might be a relief if his heart stopped, because right now it was going so fast it hurt.

"Yes." Sherlock smoothed his hands up and down John's arms with a curious, exploratory air. "Are we going to try sex now, then?"

John blinked. "What?"

"It comes with the territory, yes?" Sherlock pulled up John's shirt. "Oh, there's so much to learn about you. I can't wait to start."

\-----

Sherlock naked was exactly as John had expected: long and lean and miles of skin that just begged to be kissed. But he couldn't, because Sherlock was sprawled all over him and seemingly determined to let no inch of John's skin go untouched. John wanted to move, but he still wasn't sure this was happening, and anyway he didn't want to disturb Sherlock's concentration. Sherlock hated to be interrupted. Sherlock ran his lips over John's collarbone and up one arm, until he could press a kiss into the center of John's palm. It was hardly unpleasant, but John wanted to reciprocate.

Sherlock turned his attention to John's arm, where that long red seam ran down, and for a minute his touch turned clinical. He ran first his fingers over the edges of the healing wound, and then his lips, so light that John could barely feel it.

He must have tensed up or otherwise shown his discomfort, because Sherlock stopped almost immediately. "Does it hurt?"

"No, it doesn't hurt," John answered. But Sherlock moved away from the newer scar to focus on the older one, large and messy all over John's shoulder. He pressed his fingertips into John's skin at various places, perhaps testing for elasticity or responsiveness. It made John feel as if he were back in physical therapy.

"Do you have full range of motion?" Sherlock queried.

"Mostly. I can't raise it as high as the other, but almost."

Sherlock spoke his next words against John's jaw. "I'll move the cups from the top shelf." His voice buzzed against John's mandible. Then he stopped. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," John choked out. He wasn't sure if he was about to start laughing or crying. Neither was an appropriate response to this moment. "Nothing. Keep going."

Sherlock crawled up so that he could look down into John's face. His forehead puckered. "If I'm doing something wrong--"

"No," John gasped. He found his leverage and surged up to roll Sherlock over, so that he could push kisses into Sherlock until he understood. "You're perfect. You're perfect. You're doing everything right."

\---end---


End file.
